() is one of the largest manufacturers, distributors and marketers of nonalcoholic beverage concentrates and
Syrup s in the world.
Coca-Cola's headquarters are in
Atlanta, Georgia , in the
United States Of America .
It is best known for its flagship product,
Coca-Cola , and is one of the largest corporations in the United States. The company's stock is listed on the
NYSE and is part of
DJIA and
S&P 500 .
Coca-Cola was invented by pharmacist
John Stith Pemberton in 1884. According to the 2005 Annual Report, the company sells beverage products in more than 200 countries and territories.
In general the Coca-Cola Company (TCCC) only produces syrup concentrate which is then sold to various
Bottlers throughout the world who hold a Coca-Cola
Franchise .
The Coca-Cola Company offers nearly 400 brands in over 200 countries or territories, besides its namesake Coca-Cola beverage.
buildings in
Atlanta, GA. ]]
Pharmacist
John Stith Pemberton invented a
Cocawine called
Pemberton's French Wine Coca in 1884. He was inspired by the formidable success of French
Angelo Mariani 's cocaine,
Vin Mariani . The following year, when
Atlanta and
Fulton County passed
Prohibition legislation, Pemberton began to develop a non-alcoholic version of the French Wine Coca, adding fruit flavors, sugar & citric acid while maintaining the cocaine content which was believed to possess a number of miraculous health benefits. The name Coca-Cola was created by a partner,
Frank Mason Robinson , because it included the
Stimulant Coca Leaves from
South America and was
Flavored using
Kola Nut s, a source of
Caffeine . Pemberton ran the first
Advertisement for the beverage on
May 29 that year in the ''
Atlanta Journal '' touting his fountain drink as a patent medicine with the ability to cure headaches and relieve fatigue.
In 1887, while suffering from an ongoing addiction to morphine, Pemberton sold a stake in his company to ,
A.O. Murphey , and
E.H. Bloodworth . Meanwhile, Pemberton's alcoholic son
Charley Pemberton began selling his own version of the product. Three versions of Coca-Cola — sold by three separate businesses — were on the market.
1 In 1899, Candler sold the exclusive rights, for $1 (USD) to bottle Coca-Cola in most of the United States to three entrepreneurs from
Chattanooga, TN ,
Benjamin F. Thomas , Joseph B. Whitehead, and John T. Lupton, who subsequently founded the
Coca-Cola Bottling Company .
2 With the passage of the
Pure Food And Drug Act in 1906
Cocaine was reduced, then eliminated in the product line. In 1919, Candler sold his company to Atlanta banker
Ernest Woodruff .
When the United States entered
World War II , The Coca-Cola Company began providing free drinks for soldiers of the
United States Army . The United States Army permitted Coca-Cola employees to enter the front lines as "Technical Officers" where they operated Coke's system of providing refreshments for soldiers. Coca-Cola set up bottling plants in several locations overseas to assure the drink's availability to soldiers, setting the stage for the company's post-war overseas expansion. The popularity of the drink exploded as American soldiers returned home from the war with a taste for the drink.
Before the United States entered World War II, the difficulty of shipping Coca-Cola concentrate to Germany and its occupied states led to the creation of a new drink by a Coca-Cola employee,
Fanta .
In the 1930s,
Robert W. Woodruff became president of the Coca-Cola Company, presiding over the drink and its destiny until his death in 1985.
In 1982, Coca-Cola purchased Columbia Pictures and Columbia Pictures Television. It owned the 2 companies until 1989, when Sony Corporation purchased them from the company.
According to the 2005 Annual Report,
3 the company sells beverage products in more than 200 countries or territories. The report further states that of the more than 50 billion beverage servings of all types consumed worldwide every day, beverages bearing the trademarks owned by or licensed to Coca-Cola account for approximately 1.3 billion. Of these, beverages bearing the trademark "
Coca-Cola " or "Coke" accounted for approximately 55% of the Company's total gallon sales.
Also according to the 2005 Annual Report, Coca-Cola had gallon sales distributed as follows:
- 27% in the United States
- 27% in Mexico, Brazil, Japan and China
- 46% in spread throughout the world
In general, The Coca-Cola Company (TCCC) and/or subsidiaries only produces (or produce) syrup concentrate which is then sold to various bottlers throughout the world who hold a Coca-Cola
Franchise . Coca-Cola bottlers, who hold territorially exclusive contracts with the company, produce finished product in cans and bottles from the concentrate in combination with filtered water and sweeteners. The bottlers then sell, distribute and merchandise the resulting Coca-Cola product to
Retail Store s, vending machines, restaurants and food service distributors.
One notable exception to this general relationship between TCCC and bottlers is
Fountain syrups in the United States, where TCCC bypasses bottlers and is responsible for the manufacture and sale of fountain syrups directly to authorized fountain wholesalers and some fountain retailers.
In 2005, Coca-Cola had equity positions in 51 unconsolidated bottling, canning and distribution operations which produced approximately 58% of volume. Significant investees include:
- 36% of Coca-Cola Enterprises which produces (by population) for 78% of USA, 98% of Canada and 100% of Great Britain (but not Northern Ireland), continental France and the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Belgium and Monaco.
- 40% of Coca-Cola FEMSA , S.A. de C.V. which produces (by population) for 48% of Mexico, 16% of Brazil, 98% of Colombia, 47% of Guatemala, 100% of Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Panama and Venezuela, and 30% of Argentina
- 24% of Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Company S.A. which produces (by population) for 67% of Italy and 100% of Armenia, Austria, Belarus, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Nigeria, Northern Ireland, Poland, Rep. of Ireland, Romania, Russia, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovakia, Slovenia, Switzerland and Ukraine.
- 34% of Coca-Cola Amatil which produces (by population) for 98% of Indonesia and 100% of Australia, Indonesia, New Zealand, South Korea, Fiji and Papua New Guinea.
- 27% of Coca-Cola Bottling Co. which is the second largest Coca-Cola bottler in the United States. The company was incorporated in 1980, and "its predecessors have been in the soft drink manufacturing and distribution business since 1902." {Link without Title}
was introduced in 1982 to offer an alternative to dieters worried about the high number of calories present in Classic Coke.]]
See Also: Coca-Cola brands
The Coca-Cola Company offers nearly 400 brands in over 200 countries, besides its namesake Coca-Cola beverage. This includes other varieties of Coca-Cola such as:
Tab was Coca-Cola's first attempt to develop a diet soft drink, using
Saccharin as a sugar substitute. Introduced in 1963, the product is still sold today, however its sales have dwindled since the introduction of Diet Coke.
The Coca-Cola Company also produces a number of other soft drinks including
Fanta (introduced circa 1942 or 1943) and
Sprite . Fanta's origins date back to
World War II when
Max Keith , who managed Coca-Cola's operations in
Germany during the war, ran out of the ingredients for Coke, which could be supplied only from the United States. Keith resorted to producing a different soft drink, Fanta, which proved to be a hit, and when Coke took over again after the war, it adopted the Fanta brand as well. The German ''Fanta Klare Zitrone'' ("Clear Lemon Fanta") variety became
Sprite , another of the company's bestsellers and its response to
7 Up .
During the 1990s, the company responded to the growing consumer interest in healthy beverages by introducing several new non-carbonated beverage brands. These included
Minute Maid Juices to Go,
Powerade sports beverage, flavoured tea
Nestea (in a joint venture with
Nestle ),
Fruitopia fruit drink and
Dasani water, among others.
In 2004, perhaps in response to the burgeoning popularity of
Low-carbohydrate Diet s such as the
Atkins Diet , Coca-Cola announced its intention to develop and sell a low-carbohydrate alternative to Coke Classic, dubbed
C2 Cola . C2 contains a mix of
High Fructose Corn Syrup ,
Aspartame ,
Sucralose , and
Acesulfame Potassium . C2 is designed to more closely emulate the taste of Coca-Cola Classic. Even with less than half of the
Food Energy and
Carbohydrate s of standard soft drinks, C2 is not a replacement for zero-calorie soft drinks such as
Diet Coke . C2 went on sale in the U.S. on
June 11 ,
2004 , and in
Canada in August 2004. C2's future is uncertain due to disappointing sales.
Coca-Cola is the best-selling soft drink in most countries. In the Middle East and, the only region in the world where Coca-Cola is not the number one soda drink, Coca-Cola nonetheless holds almost 25% marketshare (to Pepsi's 75%) and had double-digit growth in 2003.
4 Similarly, in .
Coca-Cola West Japan IR report (in Japanese), 2005.
Some claim Coke is less popular in
India due to suspicions regarding the health standards of the drink. However, marketshare data does not back this view. Specifically, in 2005, Coca-Cola India's market share was 60.9%.
6 However,
Thums Up , a brand acquired by The Coca-Cola Company contributes a major part of this market share rather than Coke per se, which lags both Thumbs Up and Pepsi.
On July 6, 2006, a Coca-Cola employee and two other people were arrested and charged with trying to sell "highly classified" information to the soft drink maker's competitor,
PepsiCo for $1.5 million. The recipe for Coca-Cola, perhaps the company's most closely guarded secret, was never in jeopardy. Instead, the information was related to a new beverage in development. Coca-Cola executives verified that the documents were valid and proprietary. At least one glass vial containing a sample of a new drink was offered for sale, court documents said. The conspiracy was revealed by PepsiCo, which notified the authorities when they were approached by the conspirators.
7
The company announced a new "negative calorie" green tea drink,
Enviga , in 2006, along with trying coffee retail concepts
Far Coast and
Chaqwa .
